Hi everyone,
Today I'll be writing about the twenty-third issue of Marvel's The Hands of Shang-Chi, Master of Kung Fu. The cover showed the titular character hitting a pair of opponents with each fist, as he appeared to be falling backwards through a wooden railing toward a waiting alligator in the water below. The story was called "River of Death!" The issue had a cover date of December 1974.
The tale began on an abandoned pier looking out at the Statue of Liberty in New York. Shang was lost in thought when a hand reached out from behind him and clamped down on his right shoulder. Shang-Chi reacted instinctively by punching the stranger and knocking him into a pile of wooden crates. The stranger was none other than Black Jack Tarr. Tarr thought about retaliating but quickly dismissed that idea. Instead, he told him that Sir Dennis Nayland Smith was in their car nearby and wanted to talk to him.
The trio was soon on their way to South America, where they would seek out Wilhelm Bucher, a former Gestapo leader who was in league with Shang's father, Fu Manchu. Smith feared that the two men had nothing but evil intentions. Before long, their plane landed not far from the mighty Amazon River. They chartered a boat run by a man named Raymond Strawn. Strawn was initially reluctant to allow Shang-Chi on board, knowing his lineage. Smith and Tarr were eventually able to convince him that Shang was a trusted confidant and friend.
Shang-Chi stood on the shore while the others talked on the boat. Before they came to an agreement, Shang had disappeared. The men had no choice but to go on without him. On their way, Tarr asked Smith why Bucher would agree to work with Fu Manchu. Smith explained that several decades earlier, Bucher had worked with a Japanese operative in an undercover mission to transport secret documents to Japan. En route to their destination, the duo stopped in an underground bunker to rest. Bombardment by Allied forces caused a beam to dislodge in their bunker, trapping Bucher. His partner left the scene not long before a second salvo hit. Bucher was presumed to have been killed in the blast, but apparently that was not the case.
Bucher later resurfaced in South America and retained the documents that Manchu also coveted. Smith went on to tell Tarr that the fact that a Japanese soldier committed what Bucher could equivocate as treachery would run counter to his working with another man of Oriental origin like Fu Manchu. Tarr remarked that no members of Manchu's group were present moments before they were attacked from above by Si-Fan warriors.
In the fracas, Smith fell overboard. Tarr and Strawn fought off their attackers, while Smith came dangerously close to an alligator. Fortunately, Shang-Chi dove into the water and brought the animal to the surface, where he was able to defeat it. Shang then swam Smith back to the boat. Both men looked in horror after seeing the carnage that was the Si-Fan soldiers who lay dead thanks to Strawn's firearm. Shang was about to strike the captain until Smith reminded him that he still had to take them to Bucher's encampment.
Tarr wasn't happy about the warriors' slaughter either, and the three friends were alarmed by the sound of gunshots once more on their journey. This time, Strawn fired his revolver at a boat behind them. While Smith and Strawn quarreled, Shang slipped away once more.
The second vessel was a steamboat. Its captain commanded his crew members to increase speed, as he wanted to arrive at Fu Manchu's boat before Shang-Chi did. Little did he know that Shang was already on board his ship and soon knocked out the crewmen in the engine room. The captain sent his men after the intruder, and Shang-Chi fought them off bravely.
Shang was fighting one of the last men who revealed that his father had never been aboard the ship, and that Fu Manchu took off via helicopter to the outpost. On the other ship, the man known as Strawn took off his rubber mask, revealing his true identity and the scarred face of Wilhelm Bucher. His boat had drawn alongside the steamboat, and he fired his gun at Shang-Chi, who evaded one bullet, but not the second, before splashing down into the water below.
Bucher angrily ordered Smith and Tarr onto the steamship. Their actions were being observed by Fu Manchu from afar. Manchu declared Bucher to be a fool if he thought that he would ally with him or think that he would fall prey to his obvious trap. Meanwhile, Smith admitted to Tarr that he knew Strawn was Bucher all along and that he had hoped to trap him and Manchu together. He hoped that before everything was said and done, the waters before them would be filled with more than just Shang-Chi's blood.
I felt that this was a very satisfying set-up for a multiple-part story. Even though I'm not a big fan of Al Milgrom's pencil work, I felt that Klaus Janson inked it well enough to make the art compelling. Writer Doug Moench added a new villain, and it was good to see the heroes all working together, which is something that we'd see evolve over time during the series' run.
Well, that's all for now. Next time, I'll recap the twenty-fourth issue of Master of Kung Fu. That issue will resume the action where this one left off. We'll find out what happens to Smih and Tarr, and just how serious Shang's injury is. We'll also learn just what Bucher had in store for the son of Fu Manchu and his companions. Until then, have a great week and don't forget to be kind to one another.
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